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HISTORICAL SKETCH, 



C. H.FASNACHT, 



ORATION, 



E. K. MARTIN, ESQ., 



nEI,I\F.REU AT 



Dedication of 99(1^ Penrisylvaijia ftfonumeijt^ 

GHTTYSBURG. PA., JULY 2, 1886. 



LANCASTER, PA.: 

EXAMINER STEAM BOOK AND JOB PRINT. 

1886. 



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On the 13th of December, 1882, the surviving members of the 
99th Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers Infantry, met in the city 
of Philadelphia and organized a Veteran Association. It was 
resolved that the Association should meet on the 13th of De- 
cember of each year for a reunion and on the 12th of May each 
year for an annual banquet. At this meeting a committee, with 
Col. W. M. Worrall as chairman, was appointed to collect funds 
and devise ways and means t'^ erect a monument on the battle- 
field of Gettysburg. The money was contributed by members of 
the Association and their friends, and the monument erected near 
the Devil's Den, in the early part of June, 1886. 

On July 2d, 1886, the monument was dedicated with appro- 
priate ceremonies. A large number of old soldiers from the 3d 

i> Corps were present, and also many comrades of the G. A. R. and 

citizens from Lancaster and Philadelphia. A history of the regi- 

' ment from June 30th, 1863, to July 7th, 1863, was read by C. 

I H. Fasuacht, Co. A., 99th P. V. V. The oration was delivered 

// by E. K. Martin, Esq., late Co. E., 79th P. V. V., a member of 

f the Lancaster Bar. 

C. H. F. 

p Lancaster, Pa., July Sd, 1886. 



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♦ 



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ori)i:r of exhrcises. 



Overture — The Blue and the Grey, _ _ By the Band. 
Phayeh, . . _ . - By Geo. W. Hackman, 

SerKt. Co. B, 99th P. V. V. 

Report of Chairmaj^ of Committee ox 

Monument, . _ Col. W. M. Worrall. 

Music — America, . . _ _ . By the Band. 

Unveiling of the Monume.vt. 

Presentation of the Monument, 

By Col. Amos W. Bachman, 

President of tlic99th Pa Vet. Association. 

Music — Star Spaugled Banner, _ - By the Band. 

Reception of the Monument, _ Jiy J. M. Kkauth, Esq., 

Secretary Battlefield Memorial As>sociutiou. 

History of the Regiment from June 30th 

TO July 7th, 1863, _ By Major Chas. H. Fasnacht,. 

Lancaster, Pa. 

By THE Band. 



Music — Hail Columbia, 
Oration, 



By E. K. Martin, Esq., 

Lancaster, Pa. 



Singing — Rally Around the Flag Boys. 

Benediction, _ _ . _ Geo. W. Hackman. 



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CAMPAIGN 



99bh Regiment Pennsylvania Yolimteepg, 

AT GETTYSBURG, PA. 



An^el voices wafted from the sky, could not be sweeter to the ear. 
The pomp and paraphernalia of marshaled hosts not more beau- 
tiful to the eye, than wa.s the spectacle of a lot of little school 
children who had left their class room, and under the marshalship 
of their loyal lady teacher, were standing on t\ie porch of a coun- 
try store, waviuf,' the stars and stripes, and singing the Star 
Spangled Banner, as our own weary and foot sore regiment march- 
ed through the little village of Pinetown, on the road leading from 
Taneytown to Emmettsburg, Maryland. 

Having already served two years in the front, away from homes 
and pleasures of civil life, this incident, occuring within the 
limits of the old slave border, on the eve of a great battle, was 
soul inspiring to the tired soldiers in our ranks, and made every 
breast heave with euDtion. It was like a fiiiry-land fancy trans- 
ferred into the atmosphere of that weary march. And right 
heartily did we give three sheers and dip our colors to these little 
loyal sons and daughters of " Maryland, My Maryland." 



^J. 6 HISTORICAL SKETCH. 

^ On this afternoon, June 30, 1863, the 99th Regiment Pa. Vet- 

eran Volunteer Infantry, being part of the 2d Brigade, 1st Divi- 
^ sion, 3rd Corps, Army of the Potomac, arrived at Emmettsburg, 

p Maryland ; hard and severe marching having been done since 

if/ the 11th of June, when the regiment broke camp on the banks of 

,\ the Rappahannock, in front of Fredericksburg, Va. 

Just twenty-three years ago yesterday — July 1st, 1863, the 

'^ regiment with the rest of the 3d Corps, was thrown north of 

the town of Emmettsburg, and halted in the fields. Arms were 

V Stacked, no tents being put up, as every now and then during 

that day cannonading could be heard away in the distance 

^ towards the north. 

^ And although Major General Daniel E. Sickles had orders to 

£ move with his, the 3d Corps, to a position on Pipe Creek, guided 

"•' by the souud of the enemy's cannon, he decided to go to the 

» assistance of General Reynolds, commanding the 1st Corps, and 

** supposed to be at or near Gettysburg. About the middle of the 

) afternoon of July 1st that well-known bugle call, "fall in," was 

' sounded at headquarters, and taken up by all the regimental 

^ 5 buglers in the corps. 

P In a very short time every soldier in the regiment was in his 

f/ place in the ranks, and between three and four o'clock the 99th 

^ Regiment commenced the forced march to Gettysburg, twelve miles 

distance. 
r Col. Asher S. Leidy, having been wounded at Chancellorsville, 

and Lieut. Col. Edwin R. Biles, having been taken sick some ten 
/? days before, were not with the regiment. 

Major John W. Moore, than whom there was none more brave, 
" was in command. 

^ As the 99th passed out of the field to follow the troops already 



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HISTORICAL SKETCH. 7 

on the miirch, Major Moore, who sat bold and erect ou liis horse, 
the very beau ideal of a soldier, told each company commander 
as he passed by that the troops of the 1st and 11th Corps were 
fi^litinj,' the enemy at Gettysburg, that Major General John F. 
Reynolds had been killed, ami he likewise urged every man to 
keep well closed up. The news of the death of the noble Rey- 
nolds, and the knowledge that L^^e ami his army was in such a 
position tli:it in :ill probability a great battle would be fought on 
I'l'UMsylvania soil the next day. gave every man renewed strength 
and a <lt'terMiination to keep his i)Iace in line while on the march, 
and to be ready for the conflict on the morrow. As we got fairly 
under way, the pace was increased, and the booming of cannon 
became more di.-tinct. 

This fast and steady march, under the terrible rays of the sun, 
soon began to tell on the men. The line of march was beginning 
to bedottetl with men who staggered from the ranks and had fallen, 
fainting, by the wayside. But our pace was not slackened. 
Louder and more distinct became the sound of the distant 
cannon. And "forward, men, forward," came the command 
from our oflicers as we pushed on. About three miles north of 
Emmettsburg, as we were thus going with a soldier's steady tramp» 
tramj), we passed a mounted staff officer, who informed us that we 
had just crossed Mason and Dixon's line, and were now ou Penn- 
sylvania soil. We could discover no sign or mark of the boun- 
dary line, but gave three cheers for the old Keystone State. 

A few miles further on, the first evidences of a battle having 
been fought not far off became visible to us. Men, women and 
children, some on foot, some in wagons with a little furniture, 
bedding or provisions, made their appearance, fleeing from their 
homes, seeking a place of safety. Excitement and fear was de- 



S HISTORICAL SKETCH. 

? picted on the face of each one of these people, and some with 

tears in their eyes would tell us in a few words of the great battle 

fought that day, of the fearful loss of life in killed, Avounded 

~ and dying, and how our troops had been driven back through 

^ the town. This was not very pleasant news. And yet this very 

\ sight, and this report from these people, who had been driven 

from their own homes by the invading foe, gave nerve, strength, 

'. and a determination to every soldier in the 99th Regiment to be 

prepared to do a soldier's duty on the morrow, to fight and die, if 

^ need be, in defence of our homes and our flag, to avenge the 

death of the brave Reynolds and his comrades killed that day. 

" The regiment arrived near Gettysburg about 9 o'clock in the 

\ evening, tired, weary and footsore, having halted only two or 

^ three times, and then only for a few minutes, during the entire 

; twelve miles' march. 

With the rest of Ward's Brigade the regiment filed to the right 
vj of the Emmettsburg road, about midway between the Cemetery 

and the peach orchard. 

The orders to halt were cheerfully obeyed by all the men who had 
^ been able to keep up. The men, being tired, cared little about run- 

^ ning around hunting for water and building fires to cook coflee, but 

^ instead were soon lying down on the bare ground and slept for the 

/ night with their loaded arms beside them. Early on the morniug 

of the 2d of July, soldiers could be seen in every direction. Get- 
tysburg, a mile to the northwest, and the position that Lee and his 
^ army on Oak Ridge now occupied, was pointed out to us by some 

^ of the soldiers who had participated in the hard fought battle the 

day before. At about 8 o'clock A. M., the 99th Regiment, with 
, the rest of General AVard's Brigade, was moved out in line to the 

<^ left of the 2d Corps, and in the direction of Little Round Top. 



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HISTORICAL SKETCH. \f 

But the ground there being low and unsuited for a strong defen- 
sive position, Gen. Sickles advanced the whole of the 3d Corps to 
the high ground along the Emmettsburg road to the peach or- 
chard, and then towards the left in the direction of the wheat field 
and Little Round Top. While the regiment was lying in the 
rear of the wheat field, a detail of men under connnand of Lieut. 
Bonafon, was sent out as skirmishers. The skirmish line was 
advanced through the peach orchard and on across the Emmetts- 
burg road. The writer hereof was on the extreme right of the 
skirmish line of Birney's division, connecting with the left of 
Humjihrey's line, and while in this advanced position, met the 
rebel skirmishers, who were advancing and moving in the direc- 
tion oi' our lel't, towards Devil's Den and Jlound Top. Eiring was 
now commenced by the skirmishers, and minuie balls began to 
come too close to be comfortable. Thus it was that the men of 
the !M»th Pa. Volunteer Infantry were among those troops that 
first oj)cned the battle that was fought with such desperation and 
valor, from the peach orchard, through the wheat field, and in 
the woods, on through the Devil's Den, to the very slope of yonder 
Little Round Top later in the day. 

About 3 o'clock P. M., and while the regiment was still lying 
in rear of the wheat field, a steer was killed, the meat cut up and 
distributed to the men, who did not have time to cook the same, 
but put the raw and bloody meat in their haversacks just as the 
order was given to move forward. Our regiment advanced in 
and through the wheat field into the woods. The yellow waving 
grain was just ripe and ready to be harvested. In the morning 
the well filled heads of wheat were swaying to jsind fro, in the 
bright sunlight. But before that days' sun was down in the western 
horizon, the dead and dying, of friend and foe, covered the ground. 



10 HISTORICAL SKETCH. 

thicker than the sheafs of wheat would have done. While the 
99th was in the woods it became heavily engaged. It was at this 
time that Biruey's whole line was fiercely engaged. Longstreet 
had about three times the number of men that Sickles' had, and 
Avas moving still towards the left to outflank the 3rd Corps and 
gain Round Top. 

Major General Sickles had been severely wounded, and Gen- 
Birney now assumed command of the corps and Ward of the di- 
vision. The 12-4th New York Infimtry and Smith's 4th New York 
Battery on the left of the brigade and near the Devil's Den were 
now hard pressed. The enemy made several desperate attempts 
to capture Smith's Battery, but were driven l)ack with great loss. 
Smith sending grape and canister and the 124th New York fired 
volley after volley into their ranks. Brave Colonel Ellis was 
killed where yonder monument stands. The 99th Pa. was now 
taken out of the woods by the left flank, left in front, in rear of 
the brigade, double quick, to the extreme left of Ward's Brigade, 
formed in line facing the Devil's Den. On the right of the 99th 
was Smith's Battery and the 124th New York Infantry. The 
left of our regiment extended down over the slope in front of the 
Devil's Den to near Plum run, in the direction of Little Round 
Top. At this time there were no troops to our left, but some 
time later the 40th New York and 4th Maine were put to our left 
and in front of Round Top. 

This monument is near the spot where our brave color guard 
so nobly and heroically defended our colors. Here it was just as 
the regiment got into position that a brigade from Hood's Divi - 
sion, Longstreet's Corps, came charging through yonder ravine, 
with their eyes on Little Round Top, yet unoccupied. 

These rebel troops did not expect to find anything in their way 



WMMMIimmiWIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIHIIPIWIIIIHMIHHUWIIIIIWMIIIIIIIWHHHIIH MUM III Willi 



IIISTOKICAL SKKTCH. 11 

to ob.struct them in their onward march tuwani.s Little Round 
Top, the key of the battlefield of Gettysburg. The first intima- 
tion this assaultinix column from Hood's Division had of any 
trof)i>s being where the 9'Jth Regiment stood, was when they came 
out from behind those rocks at the Devil's Den, and a whole vol- 
ley of musketry Wii-s fired into them from our regiment, killing 
and wounding scores of their number. Some general officer was 
leading the brigade, with four or five regiments close en-masse, 
in front. Our fire was .so unexpected to them and coming from 
a point right on their Hank that it staggered and disorganized them 
s<» that they took to the shelter of the rock for some time. But 
again they advance, but our regiment too advances some distance, 
and again drives Hood's troops behind the rocks and they ilid not 
advance any farther, while the 9Uth Regiment held this position 
It was ni»w nearly five o'clock P. M., and the 8d Corps had been 
figliting hard for hours, outnund>ered three to one, holding in 
check Longstreet long enough for General Meade to occupy Lit- 
tle Round Top, with the Pennsylvania Reserves. The troops on 
our right were tslowly falling back, .stubbornly contesting every 
inch of ground. The fire from the enemy was now beginning 
to come also from the right and our position was a dangerous 
one. General Syke^ with the 1st Division, 5th Corps, Zook and 
Calwell from the 2d Corps, came anU relieved Birney's Division- 
The 9i)th Pa. moved from this position we are now standing on, 
under command of Capt. Peter Fritz, Jr., jSIajor Moore having 
been wounded, with colors flying, and in good order. In fact it 
was only when General Ward himself came, with a bullet hole 
through his hat, and ordered the regiment to the rear, that we 
retraced our steps and gave room for Syke's men to form. But, 
alas, not all the men of the regiment that were present on that 



12 HISTORICAL SKETCH. 

ever memorable 2d of July, and went into action, came back with 
the colors. Nice, Heller, Kennedy, Cummins, Bearo, Quinn, 
Hand, Casey, Henderson. Taylor and Moore, were a few among 
the one hundred and ten brave men who were killed, wounded 
and missing, and were left on the field amidst the rocks and debris 
of battle. 

This fearful loss of life on that fateful day but attested the 
bravery and soldierly qualities, not alone of the 99th Kegiment, 
but of every regiment in the divisions of Birney and Hum})iireys, 
comjiosing the 3d Corps. 

After retiring from the field that evening, the 99th, with the 
rest of Ward's Brigade, was taken to the right and I'ear of Little 
Round Top, where the regiment was supplied with ammunition 
and rations, and then laid down for a night's rest. July 8d, 1863, 
at Gettysburg, opened bright, warm and hazy. Quiet reigned 
after Geary had recaptured Culp's Hill at daylight, except now 
and then a stray shot. The inactivity of the opposing armies 
was but the calm before the storm that was soon to burst in all 
its fury, no one knew where. A little past noon General Lee 
opened with one hundred and forty pieces of artillery, and in a 
very short time every available piece of cannon from Round Top 
to Culp's Hill on the Union side was replying to the enemy's guns. 
You, comrades, that were present on that day, well remember 
how for two hours this terrible duel was incessantly maintained, in 
which the crash of the guns, the shrieking of shells and solid shot, 
the bursting and whirl of the shrapnell. and the fiying fragments 
of rock shattered by the solid shot, formed a combination of ter- 
rors which the mind falters in conceiving. During this heavy 
artillery firing the 99th Regiment with the rest of the 3d Corps 
was lying in reserve to the rear of the left centre near Round 



oBOHiBiiBBaaaHBiiiBgaaaaBwraiDB 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 13 

Top. About the time the artillery firing ceased, a solid body of 
troops, which proved to be the tlower of the Southern army, 
Pickett's Division, eighteen thousand strong, veterans of many 
battles, were seen to emerge from the woods on Oak Ridge, op- 
p(»»ite the po.sition held by General Webl)'.s Philadelphia Brigade, 
Hancock's 2d Corps. At this time theODth Regiment was ordered 
to njove forward on the double ijuick to the point of danger. 
The regiment got in line in rear of the fi9th and 71st Pennsylva- 
nia Volunteers, just as Pickett's troops struck the Union line, and 
ai*sistcd in repulsing this bust desperate effort made by Lee to 
break General Mcaile's line. After the enemy were repulsed 
here, th«! field in the immediate vicinity has never yet, nor ever 
will be fully and correctly described. In front of the stone wall, 
the ground wjis covered with dead and wounded. In the rear of 
thr stone wall, dead horses, broken caisons, dead and wounded 
soldiers, niade a sight long to be remembered. After this last 
charge of the enemy, a detail of our regiment was advanced to the 
Kiiimettsburg pike, to do picket duty, and remained there all of 
that night and part of the next day, Sunday, duly 4th. On the 
5th ami ••til the regiment lay back near Little Round Top. On 
the 7th nf .Inly, our regiment, with the rest of tJic brigade, under 
conunand of Col. Berdan, (Jen. Ward commanding the division, 
commenced the march back toward the Potomac river, to over- 
take Lee and his army before he crossed into Virginia, being the 
last troops of the Army of the Potomac to leave Gettysburg. 
This, my comrades, is the part the 99th Regiment Pennsylvania 
Veteran Volunteers took on this now historic battle-field. 

Other regiments, perhaps, may claim of having done more, or 
suffered greater loss, but none performed their duty more he- 
roically against greatly superior numbers, and stood up against 



14 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



the iron hail and cokl steel of Lee's soldiers, than did your own 
99th Regiment. This monument has been erected on this spot 
by the surviving members of the 99th Regiment, Pennsylvania 
Veteran Volunteer Association, and their friends, in memory of 
their fallen comrades. 



[front.] 

99lh Reg't Pennsylvania Volunteers, 

Army of the Potomac. 



♦ 



From September, 1861, to July 2d, 

1805. 

2d Brigade, 1st Division, 

3d Corps. 

[3d side.] 
In Memorial. 

Our Fallen Comrades, July 2-3d, 

1863. 

Erected by the 99th Pa. 

Veteran Association and Friends. 



[2d SIDE.l 
Organized July 26, 1861, at Philadel- 
phia, Pa. 

Re-enlisted February, 186-4. 
Mustered out July 2d, 1865. 



[4th SIDE.] 

July 2d, 1863. 

Present for Duty, 21 Officers, 318 Men. 

Killed, 1 Officer, 17 Men. 

Wounded, 4 Officers, 27 Men. 

Missing, 11 Men. 



A total loss of one hundred and twenty men. These are the in- 
scriptions on the four sides of this monument, simple, plain, and 
few the words and figures, and yet, what a record of a four years' 
soldier life, on the march, in the camp, and on the field of battle. 
A record that every one of you may well feel proud of 

The regiment was organized in July, 1861, as the Lincoln Le- 
gion. Three companies, A, B, and D, were from Lancaster county 



nfnaoBOOBBitBamaaai 



■BBBBBIIDOnBHHIBDi 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



15 



and the other seven companies from Philadelphia. The regiment 
went to the front a.s the o2d and later on became numbered as the 
9!Uh, being one of the first three year regiments from Pennsylvania. 
The regiment had on its rolls during the four years' service, two 
thousand one hundred and forty-three men ; was engaged in 
twenty-three battles, besides Gettysburg, where its loss in killed 
was from one to twenty-eight, not counting the many other en- 
gagements were men were wounded but none killed. The total 
loss in kilhi] during the four years was one hundrotl and sixty- 
eight. Died from disea.se one hundred and twenty-three. Total 
number wounded in battle, four hundred and ninety officers and 
men, a grand total loss of seven hundred and eighty-one officers 
and men out of twenty-one hundred and forty-three in four years. 
This attests the gallantry of the regiment and the title, "The 
Bloody Ninety-ninth," often applied to our regiment was not in- 
appropriate. The regimeni had for its officers such men as Leidy, 
Biles, Moore, Fritz, Uhler, Schuh, Bonafon, Worral, Setley, 
Ayars, Waters. Bachinan, Doyle, Ivelly, Giller, Hc^lbrook, Mun- 
sell and others Cijually brave and competent, and served under 
such tried, true and chivalric leaders as Heintzelman, dash- 
ing anil brave Kearney, Sickles, Biruey, Hancock and Ward, a 
galaxy of names that will ever remain dear to every loyal 
American heart. 

On this spot your regiment stood as firm as these rocks them- 
selves, a living wall of tire across the pathway of Longstreet's men 
on that day twenty-three years ago. This, my fellow-corarades is 
but an imperfect narative of the part taken by the 99th Regiment 
Penu.sylvania Veteran Volunteers in the battle of Gettysburg. 
The individual deeds of valor, and of heroism must be left to 
other pens than mine to more fully and justly portray. 



16 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



Your children, as they come here to this modern " Meca," and 
wander along the slopes of Round Top, across the ravine in the 
Devil's Den, and amidst these silent monuments, may well feel 
a just pride in their own hearts at the noble deeds their sires per- 
formed on this field, the Waterloo for Lee and his invading army. 

Let this granite shaft, erected here on this ground — ground 
made sacred by the blood of your fallen comrades, and dedicated 
to-day, remind the stranger as he passes by over this rocky knoll, 
that the soldiers of the Ninty ninth Pennsylvania Veteran Vol- 
unteers, were true to their Countrv, their Comrades and their 
Plag. 




^^^^^^nannQraQQwii|ii|iiMHQqQ||Q»MM»ai UMUII QnaB^MPiiP^ 



ORATION. 



There are mt)ment.s in luiiniui lii.-^tDry wlien the raven wing of 
fate ca.<ts its slmdow aero.ss the faces of men and of events. In 
such a moment, when the guns of the boy lieutenant thundered 
fmni the steps of St. Roche into the faces of the Paris mob, history 
traced the word Empire in the ashes where it had just written 
Republic. And in another such a moment, when the OKI Guard 
wjis fading away on the slo|)cs of Waterloo, she erased Em|)ire 
and wrote Exile. 

Between three and four o'clock on the afternoon of the third 
of July, 1868, General Lee, on yonder slope, turning from the 
sorriest, sternest picture that war ever traced, said in tones of 
anguish to an English officer at his side, " This has been a sad day 
for us, Colonel, a sad day." Within that hour the fourtunes of 
tlie great Conf'ideracy had been determined. It would henceforth 
become the " Lost Cause," and no (piality of valor, no sagacity 
of leadership could avert the doom; not the terrible struggling 
at Cold Harbor nor the desperate energy of Spottsylvania and 
the Wilderness. 

We are about to dedicate, my comrades, with fitting ceremon- 
ies u|)on this celebrated field, which marks the furthest limit of 
the rude shock of war the North sustained — a monument that 
shall commemorate the resting place of the dead and the valor 



">, 18 ORATION. 

^ of the living. To the nation, every stone and clod aliont Gettys- 

burg is sacred ; but to those who took i)art in the august events, 
^ which upon this soil, during those three immortal July days, 

p crowned with glory the Union arms, there are spots hallowed 

// with peculiar memories. Here thi.s one fell and that one was 

'c wounded whom we knew in the strange comradry of arms, that 

seems like a dream of long ago. To the general officer, this field 
"^ comes up in vision with one kind of recollections; to him the im- 

■ pressions that live are in the majestic sweep of brigades and di- 
■^ visions, finely forming for the shock, or at the word of command 

plunging with deafening cheers into the demoniac din of battle. 
a' To the private soldier wandering here, there come up emotions 

^ at once inspiring and melancholy. He remembers the gallant 

^ stand which brought his regiment new fame and fresh distinction 

' on the slopes of Cemetery Hill or in the gorge by the Devil's Den. 

Then the mist of unbidden tears fills his eyes, as he points to the 
**" spot where a beloved companion fell, yielding up his life on the 

h altar of his country, perhaps upon the threshold of his home — a 

comrade whose blanket and canteen and crust he had shared ou 
^ weary marches and through wasting struggles ; whose last mis- 

p sive on earth had been hoarsely whispered to him as the pitiless 

% storm of bullets broke over them, from which neither knew who 

^ ( would come forth to tell the heroic tale. I have often thought of 

those companionships of war, so tender and so faithful, and won- 
'^ dered that in the tales of exploits and triumphs more has not 

■ been made of the family life of the i-egiment, the company, and 
f the mess — a life often rudely terminated, but always sincere and 

free hearted and true. 

\ Though war may have its common curse, 

^ Its blessings yet are none the worse, 



WWWBBW— WBWJ^MnBMMi 



BIBroBHBBTOw WfflfflnmmiMl l lll l llll iiiiiMiiii M ini «'" 



ORATION. 19 

Nor are its ties. 
For he who stood in peril's hour 
At your elbow, brings his dower 
Of confidence, that hath a power 

Which time defies. 

Professed friendship must be tried, 
And sympathy may sometimes hide 

Designs for pelf. 
But he who sees the battle break 
And nerves his arm with yours to take 
The sliock that struggling armies make, 

Thinks not of self. 

The Conipte de Paris divides Gettysburt; into two fields and 
two battles, that of the first of July, in which Reynolds fell, and 
which made the concentration and alignment of the Union forces 
on the second daj possibU-, he calls Oak Hill. Accepting his 
narrative and nomenclature, the ^)9th Pennsylvania Veteran Vol- 
untei-r Infantry was present and partici])ated in the battle of 
Gettysburg proper, from its inception to its conclusion ; taking 
direct and efficient part in t\te two crowning features of that 
great engagement ; the struggle on the left on the second of July 
for the possession of Little Round Top, and the onslaught at the 
center on the third, each of which might also be designated as a 
sei)arate battle culminating in a separate victory. You are all 
too familiar with the environment, and too busy with the recol- 
lections of those heroic days to permit me, a member of another 
army, at that time .serving on a distant field, to recount each 
particular act of which we as Pennsylvanians are alike proud, 
and the glory of which we can only share with you as fellow sol- 
diers in the noblest and holiest cause that ever enlisted the ardor 
of patriotism or appealed to the promptings of manhood. 

The morning sun of the 2d of July, 1863, broke clear and 



20 ORATION. 

beautiful upon that part of the field where we are now gathered^ 
and when at 8 o'clock, General Ward led the 2d Brigade of the- 
1st Division of the 3d Army Corps, to the earliest position as- 
signed it, there was no premonition of the terrible storm of 
death that was so soon to surge and sweep across the 
placid fields and quiet copses about us, though to the veteran 
soldier the silence was ominous. Nature wore her wonted serenity. 
If she had feelings of exultation or sorrow she gave no sign or 
token ; the bees hummed in the tall grass, the birds sang and 
twittered in the trees, the grain bowing for the reaper's sickle 
moved in graceful golden billows, swayed by the freshening breeze 
of the morning. How aptly we recall Lord Byron's lines from, 
the third Canto of " Chiide Harold," 

" And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves, 
Dewy with nature's tear drops as they pass. 
Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er grieves. 
Over the unreturning brave — alas ! 
Ere evening to be trodden like the grass 
Which now beneath them but above shall grow. 
In its next verdure, when this fiery mass 
Of living valor rolling on the foe, 
And burning with high hope, shall moulder cold and low." 

As the sun rose toward the zenith and its rays seemed more 
fretful and angry there fell upon the ear at intervals from away 
off on the right the dropping shots of a skirmish line; then, by 
and by, the keen note of a sharpshooter's bullet indicated a nearer 
and deadlier foe whose lurking rifle told the practiced ear of a 
line preparing to form in its wake. Later the angry shriek of a 
shell gave warning of a position found by a venturesome battery^ 
which was feeling our line from a far ofl^ slope on the southwest ; 
but still the dark fringe of distant woods that curtained the foe; 



ORATION. 



21 



kept its secrets. It was noon ; the blistering July sun had now 
become ahuost unendurable, (^ne o'clock ; two o'clock, still no 
engagement. Three o'clock ; the suspense was ended, the fatal 
liour had at length arrived. 

Lee opened each of his great attacks upon Meade on the sec- 
ond and third of July by a withering artillery fire. In this 
attack upon the left wing his artillery was most advantageously 
posted, and as battery arter battery began firing upon Birney's 
expo.sed line it .seemed a.s if pandemonium was loosed and earth 
and air were swept with inm hail. To understand the position 
of the 9i)th Pennsylvania at this time, the disposition of Sickles' 
entire c<jrps would have to be delineatetl, which time forbids. Lee 
had reversed the tactics of Chancellorsville. He now sought to 
overwhelm the Union left and crush it; he was about to toss an 
army against a corps ; a corps, which by a delay of orders, had 
become isolated from its supports; but it was a veteran corps; it 
had fought under Kearney and Hooker on the Peninsula and 
covered itself with glory at Chantilly and Fredericksburg. We 
shall see what became of it. History has made the peach orchard 
in the bloody angle of Meade's left famous. From the peach 
orchard to Little Round Toj) every inch of ground will be 
covered by the levelled muskets of these combatants. Every 
human agency will be invoked for their mutual destruction. 
Following the wake of the deafening cannonading came 
line upon line, column upon column, of the enemy. Long, 
street, who led this attack, had thirty thousand men. 
Sickels ha<l nine thousand. There were more than three 
to one. Inequality of numbers might be attoued for by 
desperate valor, but other fields, from Antietam to the Rapi- 
dan, attested that the braverv of these combatants would be 



22 ORATION, 

fairly matched. If Sickles could hold the ground until Meade, 
who appreciated his peril, and was stripping his line at every 
point, could bring up his supports, the day might yet be saved* 
and the key to a great position preserved. This was the desper- 
ate chance that the waning hours of that half spent afternoon 
yet offered on the greatest battlefield of modern history. If Long- 
street had begun his attack an hour earlier, or Meade had come 
upon the ground an hour later, there are few military critics who 
would have hazai'ded a prediction on the fate of that slender line. 
Upon the extreme left of Sickel's line, in front of Little Round Top, 
is a rocky knoll, which, broken abruptly on its Eastern side, forms 
a gorge. Great seams and fissures give the granite pile a fautas" 
tic shape, as if the sport of some Titan age had heaped it there. 
These rocks are known as the Devil's Den. Through the gorge 
passes a stream ; where the stream enters it, stood Ward's 
Brigade, On the left of Ward's Brigade stood the 99th Penn- 
sylvania, the extreme limit of the Union army at that hour, 
supporting a battery soon to be heavily engaged. An eighth 
of a mile beyond and further to the east is the granite spur 
of Little Round Top, whose bold and rugged sides rise to an 
altitude of a couple of hundred feet and enfilade the entire Union 
front. Longstreet's attack will be a failure unless he can dislodge 
these troops and scale the summit of that elevation. Such is the 
prize and such are the combatants. The battle that opened on 
the right almost simultaneously reached this point. You who 
are the survivors of that fatal day remember the death grapple 
with Hood's column amid these granite rocks. Had the old 
demons, with whom the superstition of another age peopled these 
fastnesses, imparted some of their ferocity to the occasion which 
was turning this secluded spot into a slaughter pen ? Was it the 



,0'' 

i>i i ' i n i iiin i M i iiB«»»iiiiiiiMMmjn>iwiii.ii» pwim«iHB»iiMHiiMi» 



ORATION. 



23 



eclio of their laughter which seemed to mack the fierce detona- 
tions of the guns that bellowed death down yonder chasm. If 
the spirits of the demons were not abroad wrestling again that 
afttMiHion, the spirits of men had taken their places. If nature 
had wrought a back ground for death she could not have given it 
a luorc appropriate setting than amid these weird and gloomy 
appointments. For three quarters of an hour the brigades of 
Ward and De Trobriand, unaided, here held Longstreet's line at 
bay. Half their numbers had gone down, still they closed up 
the sjiattered front — a regiment left, where a brigade had stood 
atnoiinday; a picket line where a regiment had been. It was 
littin^^ that th'.' critical point in that hour's fight had been given 
to tin- guardianship of Pennsylvanian!?. Men of other States 
wroiiirht luirarles of valor oil that line, but the men of the 09th, 
like Antaeus, seemed to inherit superhuman strength, because they 
were touching once more their native earth. While no geo" 
graphical limits can be set to the heroism which the North ex- 
hibited at Gettysburg, I must be pardoned if patriotic regard 
causes me to advert to one other act Peunsylvanians performed 
on this part of the field. This monument stands upon the edge 
of that famous triangle of death, where Barnes, Caldwell and 
Avers, lighting on front and fighting on flank, broken and 
crushed, still answered the cheers of rebel victory with defiance 
and death. But it was too much for human endurance. Sickles 
had been wounded. Meade had had his horse shot under him. 
Cross and Zook were killed ; woods and field and gorge swarmed 
with the enemy, flushed with victory, eager with the ardor of 
pursuit. The fresh troops which Hancock had sent for 
relief to the hard pressed line were quickly enveloped 
and forced back. A division of regulars was next throwa 



leaataan uuuuimMiuww 



24 ORATION. 

in and with their disciplined valor seemed to hold the 
enemy's masses in cheek for a moment ; but they too were 
flung to rear by the same fearful impetus which had 
wu-ecked their predecessors. Birney's Hue gone loug since, 
Humphrey's in sullen retreat, portions of three corps swept be- 
fore the fierce onslaught ; fragments of regiments aud companies, 
and disordered masses of trooi)S from the faltering line, fill the 
fields and roads. " It will be a rout if this business lasts many 
minutes more," said an officer, glass in hand, surveying the spec- 
tacle from the summit of Little Round Top, whose base the com- 
batants were beginning to press. Suddenly, from out its shaggy 
sides, as if the earth opened, two lines of fire leap forth, two vol- 
leys of musketry ring upon the evening air; the rebel line falters, 
staggers on the verge of victory. What does it mean? 

A great battle is like a kaleidoscope, the variety of its transfor- 
mations are endless ; it changes in an instant. General Meade, real" 
izing that the crisis had come, now turned to his old com- 
mand, the Pennsylvania Reserves, to retrieve the day, and Gen- 
eral Crawford, their commander, seizing the brigade colors, 
rode along the lines, calling upon the men to make Penn- 
sylvania their watchword and sweep embattled treason from her 
soil forever. The loud volleys of musketry were their greeting 
to the foe, and the shining bayonets gleaming in the setting sun 
as they grandly swept out on their perilous mission, Avas their 
answer to the exhortation of their chief Above the sound of the 
cannon and the thousand voices of the struggle rang their peculiar 
battle cry ; the gallant McCandless was in the lead, aud if leader 
had been needed in that wild charge, none so fit. But every man 
was animated by a greater purpose than his calling as a soldier. 
On this line a burying party picked up the next day a private 



■msamiiaaB 



ORATION*. 25 

in whose hands was tiglitly clasped an ambrotype. containing the 
portraits of three small children, and upon this picture his eyes, 
set in death, had rested. The two Peunsylvania Brigades were 
fighting on the threshold of all they held dear on earth, one com- 
pany, K, of the 1st Pennsylvania Regiment, in the sight of home, 
friends and the smoking chimneys of their firesides. Did any 
one who saw that line swiftly pressing down that slope on its 
errand of death, think for a moment that an eciual array would 
sway it from its purpose. Meade knew its metal. He saw that 
ovcrv soldier in tho.<e brigades, catching the awful responsibilities 
of the occasion, grew great in soul. This splendid body of men 
had been the bulwark of many a shattered line in Virginia. 
Thev would l)e invincil)le in IVunsylvania. 

To the worn out soldier, who has done all that human endurance 
can accomplish, there is one supreme moment that lives in his 
memory above every other. It is that moment when the succor 
arrives which rescues him from defeat and turns his almost fruit- 
less efforts into victory. The powder-grinuned and battle-stained 
trooj)s, still heroically struggling, clinging to stone and tree and 
earth itself for cover and support, on the narrow margin of the 
field that was left them, cheered the new line as it dashed by. 
The woun<led forgot their anguish and waved their salutations as 
its spk-ndid array swept over them. The onset has been described 
as terrible. The Confederate officers threw themselves in front 
of their men, and with drawn swords, by threat and persuasion, 
sought to steady their wavering ranks ; but it was all to no pur- 
pose. Wherever the Pennsylvania Reserves struck Longstreet's 
line, it writhed like a wounded serpent, until bending back upon 
itself it quivered and broke and the battle of the 2(1 of July was 
•ended The 3rd Army Corps retired from the field with oue-half 



iii B iM iiiiii i ii imiiiiiii ii iiii iiiirniin 



26 ORATION. 

its effective force killed, wounded or missing. That afternoon's- 
fight on the left cost the Union Army ten thousand jiien. Sickels 
alone lost three-fifths ; the 99th Pennsylvania lost over thirty-three 
per cent. The night between the battles is, as every old soldier 
knows, a night of anguish, awaiting a morn of expectation — 
anguish for the dead, anxiety for the morrow. The blood has 
had time to cool, the springs of sorrow that were closed by the 
high necessities of the hour of combat well up, as he remembers 
one and another of the old mess or squad, whose silent, upturned 
faces are with the slain, or who, perhaps, are writhing in the 
agonies of unattended wounds on the lonely hillside, or in the 
dark ravine, sentinelled only by the shadow of death. 

When the morning sun of the 3d of July, 1863, threw its 
slanting rays over the slopes of Round Top and Cemetery Ridge, 
it lighted consecrated ground. Henceforth the name of Gettys- 
burg would take its place in history along with Marathon, and 
Marslon Moore ; with Wagram and Waterloo. And the issue 
was not yet decided. Whether Sickels was right or wrong in 
taking the exposed position which had involved such desperate 
struggling, such heroic endeavor, and such frightful slaughter 
on the day before, this new day was to witness the greatest blunder 
of the war, made by the greatest general it had yet produced. It 
was a magnificent blunder, and it was heroically performed, but 
it involved the fate of his government and dashed the hopes of 
millions of people. If we had time to discuss the condition of 
the Confederacy at this juncture of events, you would readily 
realize the trust committed to the Army of Northern Virginia, 
when it turned its back upon the Rappahannock and its face to- 
ward the Potomac. There was no room on General Lee's part 
to take chances. Pickett's charge was a mighty chance with the 



n \ 
IBIIIIIimiBlinin nnnffnBWW ULUii i i i iii iiiii i nnnnrmiF ffliiii i i !■■■ 



ORATION. 27 

odd:* against Lee. Perhaps Longstreet fitly designates it in a 
sentence when he says that " General Lee had lost the matchless 
equipoise that usually characterized him." 

I know I shall be excused from adverting in this address to 
what InLs become the province of historical treatment, because of 
ray desire to show exactly the relations which so small a fraction 
of the army as a single regiment occupied to the transcendent, 
events of this memorable struggle. Every school boy is familiar 
with what I think has been fairly and honestly called the greatest 
artillery duel of modern times. It was a theory of Lee's that by 
the aid of his superb e<|uipnient of guns he could sweep bare the 
crest of the ridge occupieil by the Federals, a mile and a (juarter 
distant. For tliis purpose he called into battery one hundred 
and tiiirty-cight pieces of cauou extending for two miles along 
his lines. I will give you a description of this cauonading, writ- 
ten from General Meade's headquaters at the time : 

" A shell screamed over the house, instantly followed by 
am it her, and in a moment the air was full of the most complete 
artillery prelude to an infantry battle that was ever exhibited. 
Every size and form or shell known to British and American 
gunnery shrieked, whirled, moaned, whistled and wrathfully 
tlutlcred over our ground, as many as six in a second ; constantly 
two in a second, bursting and screaming over and around the head- 
quarters, made a very hell of fire that amazed the oldest officers. 
Not an ordi-rly, not an ambulance, not a straggler was to ))e seen 
on this plain swept by this tempest of orchestral death thirty 
minutes after it commenced. Were not one huntlred and twenty 
pieces of artillery trying to sweep from the field every battery 
we had in position to resist their proposed infantry attack, and to 
sweep away the slight defenses behind w'hich our infantry were 



28 ORATION. 

waiting? Forty minutes, fifty minutes, counted on watches that 
ran, oh ! so languidly. Shells through the two lower rooms, a 
shell into the chimney, shells in the yard; the air thicker and 
fuller and more deafening with the howling and whirling of these 
infernal missiles, and the time measured on the sluggish watches 
one hour and forty minutes," 

Gettysburg may be called a tragedy in three acts. Oak Hill 
and the struggle for the possession of Little Round Top were two 
chapters in the mighty drama. As the curtain of smoke lifted 
from the mouths of Meade's eighty pieces of artillery the glasses 
that were levelled across the valley exhibited new actors sudden- 
ly advancing upon the stage for the final scene. And what actors 
these were ! The flower of the Army of Northern Virginia ; the 
veterans of many a hard fought field ; who bore on their persons 
the scars of Bull Run and Ball's Blutt'; of Fair Oaks and Cold 
Harbor; of Malvern Hill and Antietam. 

From the crest of the cemetery the line of the ridge varies, in- 
clining in places slightly to the east, the ground sloping gently in 
an opposite direction for half the distance across the valley, then 
rising to the wooded elevation of Seminary Ridge. Hancock, 
strongly posted with shotted guns, is eagerly waiting to take his part 
in the sanguinary performance. Doubleday, with soldierly instinct, 
is arranging his lines to meet the impact of this tremendous col- 
umn. Spread out upon the earth it has the shape that a tornado 
has in the heavens, that of a huge fan. It is the formidable 
wedge shaped Greek phalanx of Epaminondas over again. The 
boards of this theater, into which the quiet valley, flanked by 
the peaceful town, has been converted, will witness no mimicry 
or mockery of murder. There are watchers posted in the distant 
village who look down into this arena ; they will soon be favored 



WMUUIBIIXIUUUUUUUB 



ORATION'. 29 

with a ;:ruml spi-ctacle. Rome in the plentitude of her power, 
with the world to draw upon for her cruel games, never matched 
such coiuhatant.s as are gathering under their eyes to decide the 
fate of human liberty here, on the eve of the day that America 
rrl('l)rates a.s the natal morn of her Independence. Strange 
cuiiicidcnce ! Who selected this hour for this great catastrophe. 
Wallenstein and lionaparte each believed in fatal days. If some 
sooth.sayer had stopped Lee as he passed that historic line which 
marks the old slav*- border and warned him against the eve of 
.Inly 4th. as the augurs of Rome warned Julius Ca-sar against 
the li\r~ ..(■ March, would he. in the light of subse<iuent events, 
have caihd the warning a superstition. 

I-K.'e's Lieutenant, Longstreet, is chargetl with the execution of 
thi.s closing scene on b 'half of the Confederates. The brigades that 
i)ave been detatched for the work, are fresh men, veteran Virgi- 
nians. If there was any one in that detail of fifteen thousand sol- 
diers forming under the cover of the dark forest opposite, who 
belicvetl in prayer, now was the time to utter it. The front of 
the second FederaK'orps was to be the salient point, and Lee, it is 
said, designated a cluster of oak sapplings rising out of the Union 
<lefenses, as the general direction the column should assume. 
''These few trees," savs the Comptede Paris, "henceforth historical, 
constitute the limit before which the tide of invasion, like a snail 
on the strand, struck by a furious sea, no longer "possessing 
strength enough to draw i)ack into its shell, stops; a limit traced 
bv the blood of some of the bravest soldiers America has pro- 
duced." At length the dispositions are complete. Full of ardor, in- 
spireil by the faultless record of their army in Virginia and by 
two days of partial success here, Pickett's division moves for- 
wanl in magnificent alignment, with measured tread and the pre- 



30 ORATION. 

cision of parade, flanked and supported by his auxiliaries, thou- 
sands of muskets flash their bright barrels and gleaming bayonets 
in the sunlight, splendid but threatening. It was remarked that 
the Confederates, contrary to their usual custom, refrained from 
shout or cheer while their imposing line swei)t in silence into the 
range of the Union guns. 

Now Cemetery Hill opens its cannon on the devoted band ; now 
Little Round Top. The line winces, sways, but does not falter 
or halt. The musketry still remaining silent, " Our men," says 
General Hancock, " evincing a striking disposition to withhold 
it until the fire could be returned with more deadly effect." 
Perhaps the Union soldiers, as they clutched their pieces with 
firmer grip, were thinking of Fredericksburg, and the vengeance 
they would now reap for the awful slaughter on Maryes Hill. 
The storm of battle has been increasing in furv at every step. When 
the Confederates arrive within two hundred and fifty yards, the 
infantry, feeling the prize within their grasp, can be restrained 
110 longer. The storm becomes a hurricane. Up to this time the 
cannister had only blown gaps and lanes through the ranks; now 
the pitiless rain of bullets sweeps away the ranks themselves. 
Our infantry has an enfilading fire. This gives it the effect of 
two to one. It is deafening; it is murderous. Turbulence and 
fury, the precursors of annihilation, take possession of the enemy. 

"The game is too uneven," says a great historian of the war, 
" they must either fly or charge. These brave soldiers, encouraged 
by the example set by their chiefs, scale the acclivity that rises 
before them ; their yells mingle with the rattling musketry, the 
smoke closes over the combatants." It is at this juncture that the 
99th Pennsylvania, together with the 3rd and 4th Maine, arrive 
at double quick on the ground and take the position of supports 



liimwmvn ■ i r i nnnnm ii n ii TTnTnn Bwngnnm ""'"' ' 



ORATION. 31 

to the famous Philadelphia Brigade, composed of the 69th Penn. 
sylvania, "Paddy Owen's Regulars," the 72d Pennsylvania, Bax- 
ter's Z<}uaves, and the 71st Pennsylvania — the old California reg- 
iment. There was no hope, for Pickett's charge from its inception. 
There are men who seem to have inherited all the mischance that life 
aflords at their birth, so there are events. This was one of them^ 
Tiie point of attack selected by Lee was the readiest position on 
that entire field about which to group the ITnion army. From 
live to thirty minutes summoned supports that were irresistible; 
less than an hour would have brought every infantryman in the 
Army of the Potomac to the spot. They will point out to you 
where General Armistead, with a handful of Pickett's advanced 
brigade, penetrated the Union line. For a moment he stood there 
liencatli tlie folds of his brigade flag, his hand upcni a ca[)tured 
cannon, his blood-stained, jiowder-begrimed followers at his back. 
But it had no significance whatever beyond the picture of a piece 
of splendid daring. If the bullet that struck him to the earth 
had spared liim a moment longer he would have seen himself 
alone amid an army of exultant foes; behind him a trail of blood. 
The fan still spread out upon the earth, but a fan of corpses now. 
Before him ten thousand levelled muskets. If Lee, watching the 
slopes of Cemetery Ridge with his glass, saw the lines Meade was 
hurrving together, ma.<sing column upon colunni, he must have 
al)andoned all hope long before a musket shot was discharged by 
his men. Thirty thousand would have accomplished no more, 
they would only have prolonged the slaughter. 

I have dwelt with such circumspection upon the two great en- 
gagements of the 2d and 3d of July, because their history is your 
history, my comrades of the 99th Pennsylvania. Whatever of 
glory they contain, you share; to whatever of suffering or endur- 



32 ORATION. 

ance they summoned, you contributed your quota ; and this mon- 
ument, which we dedicate here to-day, on the granite slopes of the 
Devil's Den, where Gettysburg field proper received its earliest 
baptism of blood, and which might be duplicated yonder where 
it witnessed the final agony, commemorates the deeds of a great 
regiment on a momentous occasion. It was your singular privi- 
lege, shared by only a few regiments of the Potomac army, to 
bare your breasts to the foe at the opening and in the closing mo- 
ments of this mighty drama; and as Pennsylvanians, it was fitting 
that the start and finish shouhl alike attest your matchless hero- 
ism. 

And now, my fellow soldiers, while to stop at this point might 
satisfy the spirit of eulogy, let us elevate the vision a little 
and look beyond this place and the mad events which jostled each 
other for mastery here, out into that field of speculation which 
Davis and the leaders of the Confederacy had commissioned the 
Army of Northern Virginia, upon Pennsylvania's soil, to turn 
into reality. It was no idle hope they indulged when they broke 
up the cantonments of an army of seventy thousand men on the 
Rappahannock, and swung the heads of these veteran columns 
toward the passes of the Virginia mountains. At their front rode 
a master in war ; in their hearts was the faith of victory. The 
Richmond Examiner confidently asserted that Fredericksburg and 
Chancellorsville had paralyzed their opponents. Do you winder 
that they dreamed of the Southern cross swinging from the spires 
of Philadelphia and Baltimore, and the Southern bars floating 
majestically from the Capitol at Washington ? There is ever 
pi-esent in human affairs the unknown, and men wrestle and are 
beaten because its presence has not entered their calculations. The 
southern leaders mistook the mettle of their adversaries in the. 
midst of their firesides. 



iimimygwiraTni 



ORATION. 



33 



'riicn; \v!>„>< imotlu'r motive which pr(ini])tt'il tiie Confederacy 
to iiiKlcrtiike tiiis mighty invasion of the North, whose force 
you hroke upon the rock girt slopes at GettysDurg. While 
war is raging diplomacy is silent. It waits on victory or 
defi.-at. In every court of P2urope a knot of ardent secession- 
ists were striving to influence governmental seutimeut in favor of 
the South ; St. James and the Tuilleries swarmed with their titled 
adhcrciit.s. Ever since the recognition of the belligerent rights 
of the Confederacy, it had l)een war on the Union in disguise by 
l»otli JCngland and France. A great objective campaign crowned 
l>v a single victory, the C'onfederates confidently declared, would 
cause both these countries o|)enIy to acknowledge their nationality, 
with all tiiat that term implied. At the same time, the North it- 
self had lt«(ii lioiieyeombed by sedition, and emissaries were 
evervwli'Tt', npparentlv with ;i common pui])ose, preparing for 
that linal tumuli which one successful battle by Lee would inau- 
gurate in all the great centres of poj)ulation. Thus it happened 
when the Army of the Confederacy was gaily sweeping through 
the Blue Kidge and across the Potomac, the North had arrived 
at the darkest hour in the great rebellion. 

If th(! shots of the endjattled farmers at Lexington were 
heard around the world, the sound of the guns of Gettys- 
burg carried dismay into every court circle of Europe. The 
diplomatic correspondence of that jjcriod with both England 
and France shows a tension that marked our relations as 
strained in the highest degree; a tension from which nothing but 
military success could rescue them. The Emi)eror Napoleon was 
in the midst of his intrigue for the establishment of his great 
Latin Empire beyond the seas. The Davis government would be 
Ma.xamilliau's ally. This alliance was his pet scheme. About ten 



34 ORATION. 

years ago the United States purchased from private sources the se- 
cret archives of the Confederacy. Among the curious records these 
contain came into its possession the diplomatic correspondence of 
the rebel States with their commissioners in Europe. At the time 
you were struggling on these hills in mortal combat, Roebuck, 
at the suggestion of the French Emperor, was pressing his motion 
in the British House of Commons for English recognition of the 
South. And Napoleon was entertaining Slidcll in the Tuilleries 
with professions of the warmest friendship. That debate was 
cut short by the guns of Gettysburg, and these professions gave 
place to cold diplomatic formalities after Lee returned behind the 
Potomac, with his seventeen miles of wagon trains bearing the 
wounded and the dying of the Confederacy. Gladstone, who to-day 
is standing on the skirmish line of an idea scarcely second to our 
slave emancipation, dec^lared that Jefferson Davis had made an 
army, had made a navy, had made a nation. When the news of 
Gettysburg was wafted across the water, the mercury that registered 
public sentiment in London and Paris, and which had steadily 
risen on the Confederate thermometer before the flame of enthus" 
iasm that started at Bull Ran, as steadily fell until it touched the 
hopeless zero of Appomattox. General Butler, when he summed up 
those stupendous losses known as the Alabama claims, gave two 
columns of figures for England to consider, the direct damages 
and the consequential damages. You will pardon me if I have 
dewlt too long on the consequences of Gettysburg, but no survey 
of this battle, however brief, can be complete without an ex- 
cursion into the wide field of these influences. 

I know that the soldiers of the North do not exult over the 
death of the brave men who fell here, except so far as it became 
their duty to conquer them in order that they might crush their 



ay yuyyhMUMuyyii — OOPCDnmiBaailMBniiaaaH 



ORATION. 35 

f'niiso. Jk'fore 1861, the nation had learned every trade of peace. 
Then came its sad ajjpreutieeship to war. After 1865, we added 
a new accdinplislinient, which no nation ever possessed before, and 
which we ourselves liad not grace enous^h to practice earlier. 
That acconii)li!jhnient was forbearance, and it has become tlie 
brightest page in national life in the woHd, and the newest. 

One hundred and forty years ago, Enghind had a revolution, 
and'because she persecuted Charles Edward through every Capi- 
tal of Kuroj)e, though a profligate and a sot, his name lives in 
the sweetest song and the richest story of that gifted age. The 
otiier day, France distrustful of public sentiment, banished from 
its borders "The Princes." It has sent exiles forth before, 
who have come back Emperors. Last Ai)ril, Jefferson Davis, 
whose highest title to consideration in the United States is that 
he is " a reminiscence," like Tom Payne, or the author of Shay's 
rebellion, unticM'took to make ay[)ilgiimage to his first seat of 
government. He found his White House in Montgomery con- 
verted into a boarding house, his government offices of twenty- 
five years ago, converted into a feed store; his treasury building 
a grocery. Nothing lo envy, hardly enough to provoke contempt. 
Some inconsiderate people got up an ovation. Some partizan 
newspapers raised a howl about " the reign of Dixie ;" but most 
sensible persons said, " let the old fool alone," and so he plunged 
back into the obscurity from which he had emerged. Oblivion 
closed over him, and the waves were quickly smoothed out with- 
out a ripple to show where he sank. This is the biggest country 
on earth. In twelve months tlie most portentous occurence has 
become stale. AVe have no time to persecute exploded ideas or 
to nurse grievances or tom-foolery, whether they be in Jeff. Davis' 
treason to an old-fashioned Union, or Bob Ingersoll's treason to 
an old-fasliioued hell. 



S6 ORATION. 

But I must close. The French nation has sent us a magnificent 
statue, of colossal proportions, to be placed at the gates of our 
commercial metropolis. That their appreciation of the great 
mission of the American people in human history may be fitly 
symbolized, they have bestowed upon this gigantic work of their 
most celebrated artist, the title of " Liberty Enlightening the 
World." It is a majestic thought and a touching tribute from 
the latest republic of the old world to the earliest of the new. 
But we stand in the shadow^ to-day of a mightier tribute to liber- 
ty than the collossus which France is rearing in New York har- 
bor. Hei-e liberty was engaged in the most desperate struggle 
she ever entered upon in all the travail of the ages. If Lee's 
forces had won in the struggle of giants here, American freedom 
would have remained a paradox. This valley, like the troubled 
borders of the Rhine, in ages past, would have become the fretted 
highway of armies, bent on ^^illage or reprisal. This lovely sec- 
tion of our commonwealth, the edge of a slave mart, re-enacting 
pei'haps the scenes of Senegambia and the Soudan. It is yonder 
marble shaft, rising from the crowning point of this immortal 
field, its base sentinelled by the dead heroes who repose where 
they fell that in' a more imposing sense represents "Liberty En- 
lightening the World." 

And as we rear our modest pedestal beside it how can I more 
fitly conclude these solemn exercises than by repeating the immor- 
tal sentences uttered here upon another occasion by that immortal 
man, who God gave us in the hour of our necessity, — 

"But in a large sense we cannot dedicate; we cannot conse- 
crate ; we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and 
dead, who struggled here have consecrated it far above our poor 
power to add or detract. The world will little note nor long re- 



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dRATION. 



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hiember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did 
here. It is for us the living rather to be dedicated here to the 
unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly 
advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to. the great 
ta.sk remaining before us, that from these honorf^d dead we take 
increased devotion to that cause to which they gave the last full 
measure of devotion ; that we here highly resolve that these dead 
shall not have died in vain; that this nation under God shall 
have a new birth of freedom ; and that the government of the peo- 
ple, by the people and for the people, shall not perish from this 
earth." 



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